3.18.2007
Coasting Along & Getting Paid Good Money
© Copyright 2007 Stan Spire
Hey, I’m now coastal!
I always wanted to live near the ocean. Enjoying an invigorating sea breeze, watching the sun either rise or set over the vast waves.
Well, that ain’t gonna to happen. As long as I live near the recently designated “Adirondack Coast.”
Adirondack what?!
Take out of map of this area, the northeastern corner of New York State (AKA NENYland). Find Plattsburgh, where I survive – I mean, live. It’s located in Clinton County. To the west stand the Adirondack Mountains. To the east sits Lake Champlain, separating this neck of the woods from Vermont (fortunately for Vermont). To the north runs the US-Canadian border.
If you’re looking for real cities, you have your choice of Burlington, Vermont, or Montreal, up dere in Keybec.
NENYland suffers from an inferiority complex when it competes against Burlington and Montreal. Basically, that’s because there’s nothing here of cultural value, unless you’re into snowmobiles and pick-up trucks.
Now let’s take another look at the map. The region around Lake Champlain is called the Champlain Valley. Why? Because there's a valley around the lake. As far as I know, a valley is an area separate from a mountain range. It can be argued where the transition from mountain to valley occurs, but there is a transition. So what is this Adirondack Coast crap?
Apparently some entity called the Champlain Shores Visitors and Convention Bureau – the official tourism agency of Clinton County - needed a new angle on the region to promote it. So someone making good money looked at a map, ignored geography, and came up with the Adirondack Coast misnomer, somehow merging the lake's shoreline with the mountains. And to make it official, they put up a web site (www.goadirondack.com). After all, if it’s on the Net, it must be real.
A spokesperson for the Champlain Shores Visitors and Misnomers Bureau said that group tour links at the website will lead people to events in Burlington, Montreal, and Lake Placid. The plan is to market Clinton County as “a central location to these other communities.” (Press-Republican, Page A5, March 14, 2007)
Really. Will that change the fact that Burlington or Montreal makes a better central location? By staying in either city, one will still be within a day’s drive of most events in the region. And with either city, you will be already close to major events. Why stay here in the hinterlands of NENYland and have black flies bite your ass?
How desperate will NENYland become in trying to sucker people into coming here? Maybe it will put up a website and declare that Burlington is just the Translake Suburb of Plattsburgh. Or maybe it can try to alter reality with a slogan like “Montreal: Clinton County’s Bitch.”
